Halo
by ladyrostova
Summary: Petunua/Lily, MINOR incest, slash.


She had used the word 'freak' because it had been the most hurtful thing her childish vocabulary could produce.

It was a word she often applied to herself when she laid in bed at night and thought of her sister, her perfect little sister, who was consummate in everything she did––when she laid in bed and wished she was her sister, wished for nothing more than to be just like her in every regard, in every pursuit––she wanted so fiercely with her child's heart to be a perfect picture of Lily that the line between her own identity and Lily's was blurred.

So Petunia would lay in bed at night and look at her gangly awkward self and crinkle her limp straw-blond hair and call herself a freak. She was too skinny and too tall and her teeth were bucked and her eyes were too big and too watery. It was as if every good trait to be had between Mr. and Mrs. Evans was transferred to Lily by default, leaving Petunia a defunct group of genes strung together by insecurities.

'Lily, promise me you'll give me the bouquet at your wedding,' Petunia said one night many years ago in a hushed voice as they lay, curled into one another, on Lily's bed.

'You know the rules, Tuney, you have to catch it, otherwise it isn't fair,' came her equally silent reply, her eyes staring at her sister's eyes matter-of-factly.

'No, but you've got to promise me you will,' she pleaded, straining to keep her voice quiet. 'Promise me, Lily?'

'Alright, I promise. But why?' Lily thought Petunia was acting awfully peculiar and she wanted to get to the bottom of it. Didn't she know the basic rules of a wedding? It was something _every_ girl should know by heart, after all.

'Because the girl who catches it always gets married next, no matter how ugly she is. Someone will find her and love her because that's what happens when she catches the bouquet.'

'Tuney, are you crying? Oh, stop it. You're going to get married to a great big handsome man whether you catch the bouquet or not, and he'll love you just as much as I do.'

Petunia continued to weep softly until Lily held her face in her hands and kissed her lightly on the mouth, and said, 'Don't cry, Tuney, please, I know you'll find a boy who will kiss you just like that.'

But she never went to Lily's wedding. She never caught the bouquet.

She did find a man to kiss her and love her but he was not big and handsome, he was only big. She married him when she was eighteen and he twenty-two, and they married purely out of an understanding for one another.

He was ugly, and she was ugly, and in their ugliness they belonged together.

'Really, Petunia, I'm just glad you're getting married at all. I didn't think you would. And Vernon is a nice man. Very polite. I only wish you would let Lily come to the wedding. I remember when you both planned out your weddings to one another, vowed to be each other's maid of honor…look at you both now. Such a shame you pushed her away,' Mrs. Evans had said on Petunia's wedding day as she fastened Petunia's limp blond hair into a plain up-do.

The last thing Petunia needed on her wedding day was her mother's insensitive comparisons, let alone her constant pushing of blame onto her for having destroyed the relationship she once had with Lily. As if it was _her_ fault that Lily grew up to be a freak of nature. As if it was _her_ fault that once again, Petunia was handed the short end of the genetic stick.

'Thanks mother, I'll do it myself,' Petunia said, standing up abruptly and waiting till Mrs. Evans left before she broke down into bitter tears and wished, in spite of herself, that Lily would come and kiss them away like she did all those years ago.

But Lily never came, and Petunia walked down the aisle and married Vernon Dursley, and she didn't toss the bouquet because it was a small wedding and the only guests were Petunia's parents and cousins and Vernon's family and coworkers; all in all, a party of perhaps twenty.

She wondered why, as she slipped on the ring binding her to Vernon forever, she thought again of her sister's kisses.

That night she thought of them too, as Vernon crushed her tiny body with his weight, as he slobbered all over her, as she strove to stifle her cries of pain when he parted her thighs and took her. She closed her eyes and bit back her whimpers and sought comfort by imagining it was Lily holding her close, Lily kissing her tears away, Lily petting her head and telling her everything would be alright, that it was almost over and she could make it.

That morning she awoke early and soaked her sore and crumpled body in a hot bath and drafted a letter to Lily that she would never send. She cried over her cup of tea but dried her tears before Vernon awoke and asked her why she hadn't made breakfast yet.

On her way to the market to fetch some eggs, Petunia saw a pair of children darting through the streets, laughing as they chased one another. One blonde, another redheaded. She tried to swallow the memory that this sight inspired but could not, and found herself involuntarily remembering the second time Lily had kissed her.

'You changed the room,' Lily had said, having returned home for the summer after her third year. She sounded either disappointed or angry, Petunia couldn't tell which.

'Of course I did,' Petunia snapped. 'We don't share it anymore. Mama decided to give us our own rooms now that you're gone half the year.' What she didn't say was that Mrs. Evans had decided to do this because she'd found Petunia lying in Lily's bed crying nearly every day for a month and removing her from the room seemed the only viable option to remedying her daughter's depression.

'Oh,' Lily said, setting down her bags inside their old room, now distinctly lacking Petunia's half. She sat down on her bed and stared at her sister, who looked even more sullen than she had the year before. 'How do you like school?' she ventured, softly, trying to ease into a comfortable topic.

'I'm top of my class,' she lied nonchalantly, trying desperately to impress her sister, to show that while Lily was off in fairytale land, Petunia was doing amazing things too. She didn't tell Lily that she skipped school more often than she went because the boys called her 'horse-face.' She didn't tell Lily that she sat alone at lunch, was picked last every gym class, was never a recognizable face to her teachers.

'That's great, Tuney,' Lily said, smiling genuinely, 'I am too, actually. My professors say I'm the brightest witch of my age.' She was beaming.

'Oh,' she replied, flatly.

'I'm glad you're doing well,' Lily said, and she meant it. Petunia may have hurt her deeply, but Lily was not one to hold grudges. She loved her sister. She reached to pull her into a hug and Petunia backed away reflexively.

'Don't touch me.' Petunia was terrified of Lily, who now was apparently 'the brightest witch of her age' and must have been very powerful. She was scared to get too close. 'You're still a _freak_.'

Lily had taken that as her cue to leave.

A day later, Lily learned the truth of Petunia's supposed 'success' at school and found her in her room.

'Oh, Tuney, why didn't you tell me how terrible they are to you?' Lily was crying. She loved her sister. She didn't want anyone to call her such horrid names.

'Because I didn't want you to know that you're still perfect and I'm still ugly little me!' Petunia shouted, putting as much distance between herself and Lily as possible. When she began to cry, it came in uneven, haggard, angry gasps. 'You don't know how big of a shadow you cast, Lily! Every day you're living a _fairytale_, mama and papa tell me how _sad_ they are for me, how they wish I was magic too, that I was more like _you_. Every day of my life since you were born I have been trying to fill your shoes and it's not fair, it's not _fair_, and I didn't want you to know that I'm still wretched and pathetic and you're still, well, _you_.'

Lily was stricken with silent guilt, for she knew most of this was true, and in fact resented their parents a bit for it. She had grown up with Petunia being constantly jealous of her and with their parents constantly giving her reason to be. She approached Petunia carefully, as if she was a bird that would fly away at any moment, and took her face in her hands.

'I think you are _beautiful_, Tuney, and I think you are a lot better than you give yourself credit for,' Lily said softly before she kissed her on the lips and brushed back the hair from her face.

She pulled back and hovered over her face for a moment before Petunia sobbed, 'Why are you so _perfect_?' and shoved her away. 'Just _go_!' she screeched, and Lily ran, slamming the door behind her.

Petunia's eyes filled with tears at the memory and she sniffled audibly, hoping no one nearby in the market could hear her.

She had wanted to run away from Vernon, from her new home, her new life, from everything. The thought of returning to his fat little face sickened her, filled her with icy dread.

But return she did.

Years later she received a wedding invitation from her estranged sister. She was pregnant now and somehow became even more awkward than before and reflected on how humorous it was that she had been the one to marry first. She held the invitation to her breast and then tossed it in the trash.

She wished she had kept it.

It wasn't long after Lily's wedding that she heard of the tiny nephew she would later that find on her doorstep. She could have sent him to foster care. She could have done any number of things. But when she scooped him off the ground and looked into his eyes, she was almost convinced she was looking straight into Lily's, and to this day she privately asserts that is what made her brush the tears from his cheeks, kiss his lips, and take him inside.

It was true that she hated Harry. She hated him like she hated her sister, because he was _special _and it wasn't fair. He was a living testament to the destructive power that had obliterated both his parents. He survived but her sister didn't. She died trying to save him, and what a very _Lily_ thing to do, after all. He was the reason why her sister was dead.

She cried over this but she did not tell Vernon so.

There were a great many things she did not tell Vernon, or _anyone_, for that matter.

She did not tell anyone that every year on Lily's birthday, she visits her grave in Godric's Hollow, leaves a flower there, and lightly kisses her headstone.

She did not tell anyone that she enjoyed her sister's kisses more than her husband's.

She did not tell anyone that she would give anything to be a child again.

She would give anything to be back in bed with Lily planning their weddings, making each other promises that they did not know they would never grow up to keep.


End file.
